


by each let this be heard

by amatchforyourmadness



Series: what two sides of a coin mean to one another [6]
Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-24
Updated: 2020-06-28
Packaged: 2021-03-03 23:14:50
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 21,118
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24723628
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amatchforyourmadness/pseuds/amatchforyourmadness
Summary: As Merlin leans down to kiss the druid girl's lips, Arthur hands rises to cover his mouth and hold back his sobs.(or the Lady of the Lake AU nobody really asked for)
Relationships: Freya/Merlin (Merlin), Merlin & Arthur Pendragon (Merlin), Merlin/Arthur Pendragon (Merlin)
Series: what two sides of a coin mean to one another [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1745929
Comments: 25
Kudos: 141





	1. ⳺ with a kiss⍮

**Author's Note:**

  * For [HicSuntDracones](https://archiveofourown.org/users/HicSuntDracones/gifts).



> Work inspired by this tumblr post ( https://mamalaz.tumblr.com/post/93220169052/lady-of-the-lake-au-arthur-follows-merlin-to-the ), by Oscar Wilde's The Ballad of Reading Gaol, while listening to this absolutely banger of a medieval version of Somebody That I Used To Know (https://youtu.be/Ch1aVmjvYTI) + Jolene (https://youtu.be/ugqQlB5fpuc) and for my most lovely muse, Bella, who loves me and my angst.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When Merlin frees a druid girl from a bounty hunter's cage, he's laying the groundwork for not only his heartbreak, but Arthur's as well.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “When one is in love,  
> one always begins by  
> deceiving one's self,  
> and one always ends  
> by deceiving others.  
> This is what the world  
> calls a romance.”
> 
> — 𝘖𝘴𝘤𝘢𝘳 𝘞𝘪𝘭𝘥𝘦.

_**⌠ the coward ⌡** _

“If he's not better in the morning, let me know.” Gaius instructs the sick man's wife, and Merlin helps him into his coat.

It's the last house call of the day, and hopefully the last of his tasks if Arthur is to be trusted to have a good mood and not be an ass, so he represses a tired sigh at the late hour and the thought of the cold outside the door, as rain pours and lighting and thunder take turns mocking him. They bid their farewells and the woman — Lumri, he believes — thanks the both of them profusely in their way out.

Small mercies: the rain has halted when they walk out even as the thunderstorm rumbles above them, in silence and tired, through the town deserted in the hour most are asleep, sidestepping puddles of water and passing the Rising Sun, eyes on the ground. He barely notices when he passes by a horse-drawn cage, but it's impossible to miss the young woman who throws herself against the bars, fingers holding the iron and shackles making that terrible sound as chains and bars hit against each other, making him take a step back and turn to better look at her. His shock quickly turns into concern at the sight of her: torn red dress, drenched, left to rain and cold, terrified and trembling m

“Gaius.” He calls for his mentor.

“She's fallen prey to a bounty hunter.”

A bounty hunter? He's used to the witch hunters and to the villagers accusing each other of sorcery when one gets a better crop than the other, but this? He turns to the old physician, horrified.

“She's only a girl.”

“She'll still fetch a good price, though.”

“Someone's going to pay for her?”

“Uther offers a handsome reward for anyone with magic.”

Of course he will, he thinks. He isn't even surprised. He will pay to have the girl and to burn her in the stake, as if she was an animal to roast on a Sunday — except, usually, people don't hate the boar they roast, they just like the taste of it. He turns to her, brows furrowed. Maybe Uther just grew to like the sound of screams.

“There must be something we can do." He says, and he must betray in his tone something along the lines that he's more than willing to do it, because Gaius stops once more on his way back to the castle, ready to leave the girl helpless and to meet some bloody fate.

“Merlin, bounty hunters are dangerous men.” He warns him, with an air of finality. “They're not to be meddled with. You of all people should understand that.”

 _Don't do anything stupid_ , is what he means, _let her be_. He turns again, with no intention to stay or discuss the matter further, and Merlin can't help but look back at the girl, scared, holding into the bars, probably to be burned tomorrow afternoon if Uther is to get his hands on her. He wonders, vaguely, if Gaius didn't know he was his mother's son, if he had arrived on Camelot in shackles as well, scared and shivering and caged as she is, if he would have turned a blind eye and barely thought about him after he had turned to ashes along with the stake.

They go back to the Castle, and if Gaius feels the questions he harbours, knows the conflict and the hurt and disapproval in the way Merlin avoids to look at him or is silent throughout the whole meal, he doesn't say anything. He retreats to his room, instead, and waits sat on his bed, determination coiling at the bottom of his stomach, listening for the moment the old man's snores will cut the air, indicating he's asleep. It doesn't take too much time, so he stands and takes light steps out of the Physician Chambers and back into the lower town, sticking close to the shadows and away from any wandering eyes. He sees her on the right corner, hunched and defeated, and opens the door to the the tavern quietly, peeling inside and nodding to himself when he sees the bounty hunter is occupied with eating a price of meat as if he was a caveman, before going to the caged girl.

“Don't worry, I'm not going to hurt you." He whispers, holding onto the cage before turning his attention to the door. “ _Tospringe_ ." The cage door breaks open and she lets out a soft gasp, before he jumps into the cage with her, putting his hand over her manacles even as she backs away from him slightly. “ _Unspene þás mægþ!_ ”

The manacles break off and he takes her hand with an encouraging smile, frightened as she is she still decides to follow him, which is good because the floor to the tavern opens right as they hide behind the cart and the bounty hunter exits. The man takes barely a moment to catch up to what happened, walking towards the cage's door and inspecting it, looking around for her. Merlin can feel her shivering, looks at her and sees her scared look at him, and he swallows over the lump of his throat, peeking his head over their hiding place to see the bounty hunter looking at the alleyway by the tavern. His eyes snap to the wooden sign above him and his quick thinking finds the best solution he can come up with, under pressure as he is.

“ _Ic bebíede þis giestærn tácen fielan_.”

The tavern sign breaks off, falls upon the bounty hunter's head and Merlin takes his opportunity to grab the girl's hand once more and runs through the streets he knows by now like the back of his hand. He stops when he sees guards approaching in their nightly shifts and a glance over his shoulder shows him the bounty hunter has recovered slightly, looking at their direction, so he squeezes her hand and pulls her towards the tunnels under the castle, grabbing for one one of the torches and lightening it under his breath with a spell, going deeper and deeper into the corridors he knows no one ever uses until he thinks she's safe enough to stop and let her breathe.

“They won't find you here.” He assures her, propping the torch on the wall to light the place so she's not left in the dark. Once again, he takes notice of her torn dressed and remembers she must have been left in the rain for far longer than the time between Gaius' house and Merlin's arrival, so he takes off his jacket. “Here.” The boy tries to offer, but the girl shrinks back and he takes the hint to back away as she crosses her arm protectively over herself, face turned towards the ground as she looks at him hesitantly. “Sorry, I didn't mean to frighten you. I just… thought you might be cold.”

“Why did you do that?”

“What?”

“Help me.”

_Because no one would have helped if it was me._

“Well, I saw you and…” He pauses, thinks if it's wise to say what he's about to say, but that voice sounds too much like Kilgharrah's or Gaius', and he's fairly disillusioned with the both of them. His eyes lose focus as he recalls the way Gaius had walked away from her when he could have helped, when he probably could have helped countless others, innocents burnt during all these years. “It could've been me in that cage.” He continues, thinks to say ‘ _and I would have been afraid and cold and alone and I could not leave you that way’_ , but instead: “You'll be safe down here. I'll come back in the morning with some food and candles.” He tries to smile, one of those smiles he gives Gwen when she's not feeling well or grants Morgana when she's scared in the dark of the night by her visions and tells him things as if he's the only one he can trust. "Will you be alright till then?”

The girl nods, clearly scared but no longer _of_ him. He supposes it's as good of a situation as any.

“I'm Merlin, by the way.” He offers, not expecting a reply but is rewarded with a softly whispered:

“I'm Freya.”

The smile that blossoms this time is not tailored to her, but completely out of his own joy.

“Freya.”

Merlin offers her his jacket again, timidly even, and she accepts it, wrapping it around her shoulders. Something warms him, but it's not the flames from the torch.

“I'll see you in the morning, Freya.” He says, moving to leave.

“Thank you.” Freya says, quiet as a mouse and still without looking at him.

He peeks from the corner he was about to turn, nods and leaves.

He can't quite stop smiling.

* * *

He wakes in the morning to the familiarity of Merlin opening the curtains, and cheerily announcing ‘Breakfast!’. He finds it weird there was no other snarky comment on his part, no ‘rise and shine’, no attempts to drag him from his bed. He wouldn't be caught dead admitting it, but it's a routine he's rather fond of, so he sits up on the bed with a little more clarity than usual once he hears Merlin walk towards the door, apparently soon to leave him despite the fact he had just arrived and had barely talked at all with him.

Did he do something wrong yesterday? Upset Merlin in some way? This felt like the equivalent of Morgana's cold shoulder and he did not feel like pouting, but he couldn't guess for the world what he could have done to cause such a change of attitude. His eyes take in the retreating form if his gangly manservant and then the plate in front of him, and Merlin must be pissed, because that's stake bread and something that could scarcely be called an apple.

“Oi!” He calls out, looking confusedly between the plate and Merlin (who at least had the decency to stop, but is still waiting on the doorway, waiting for a chance to slip away from his room and from Arthur himself, probably), golden brows furrowed. “Where's the meat? Cheese?”

“That's the new breakfast menu.” He answers, no hesitation about him.

Arthur takes both bread and apple in one hand, and it _fits in one hand_ , showing it to Merlin as if to try and have him see sense, or maybe just coax him closer, because he didn't even receive a good morning! It's Merlin, for crying out loud, he always says good morning! Even when it's a no good morning, way too early to be awake!

“This isn't enough.”

“Well, we've got to keep you in shape.” He declares and Arthur cocks his head to the side, disbelieving. He's barely spoken to him, hasn't bid him good morning, gave him scraps as breakfast as is now calling him fat?

“I'm fighting fit!”

“But we want to keep you that way.”

If Arthur was a more sensible person, he would try and get to the bottom of this weirdness he didn't quite get, but seeing as Arthur is Arthur, what happens is he throws the food at the spot directly above his head, missing him on purpose as he does way more often that he should.

“Merlin!" He cries out, enraged, before an idea crosses his mind and he smiles at his manservant like Morgana smiles at him when she's about to make his life quite unpleasant. “Is there somewhere you have to be?”

“No, of course not!” Merlin denies quickly, shaking his head and finally stepping into the room once again and closing the door behind him.

Perfect.

“Good. 'Cause I've got some chores for you to do.”

Merlin gets that resigned look to him and sighs, but Arthur won't soften. He sends him to draw him a bath and sets about taking his clothes off behind the screen, losing himself to a thoughtful reconstruction of the day before, trying to pinpoint something that could have been the cause for this shifty mood of his, but Merlin, as always, eludes him in too many ways to truly understand him, no matter how much he craves to know him like the servant must know him by now. He listens as Merlin shuffles into the room, struggling with the buckets of water as he fills the tub. Arthur waits for a comment, or a grumble or anything he can latch onto to make into a conversation, but Merlin remains as silent as a well behaved servant should.

It irks him, if Arthur is to be honest.

“Make sure it's hot enough!” He calls out, mindlessly, if only to get a retort back, but no such thing happens. Arthur smile dies down and his mood falters slightly, so he just stands behind the screen, confused and expecting an answer, _anything_ , holding the towel around his waist and some of his so called prattiness to his chest so he could walk as if nothing had happened and make a good day out of this still. He fights back a frown, walks out from behind the screen and tries again: “Is it ready?”

“Yep." He says, dismissively, sparing him a glance and nothing more before changing his focus back to his chore — and alright, maybe giving him this many chores wasn't a good call, because he had at least 25 of them to use an excuse to distract himself from Arthur. “Freshly heated.”

He sighs internally. At least he has a bath, he supposes, holding onto the edge of his bathtub and dipping his feet in.

Here's a thing of things he expected: a warm bath and awkward silence.

Here's what he gets: probably a third degree burn at the sole of his foot, because the water is hot as if Merlin had heated it with his newfound hatred for him, apparently.

“Ah!” He screams, clutching his foot and takes some pleasure to see the panicked look to Merlin's eyes as he looks at him with concern, but his anger rises all the same. “You bumpkin! It's boiling!”

“Boiling?”

“You are half asleep today!”

“I'm sorry, Sire. I'll get you some cold.”

“No, I'll get you some.” Arthur says, before grabbing the pitcher by him and splashing Merlin with water, which, yes, looking back wouldn't the kindest thing to have done when Merlin was so clearly off already, but his foot had just been _burnt in boiling water_ , so he considered himself worthy of a pass, even as Merlin stood, eyes closed, mouth agape in outrage soaking to the point water pooled around his feet and droplets of it fell from his hair, nose and limbs. There's a self righteous rumble to the back of his mind that has him spitting: “That woken you up?” as he turns to walk away from him, fume his anger out somewhere else.

There's a bitterness to his face that Arthur doesn't miss, like he resents the way he was treated (which was understandable) and something new, a longing to be somewhere he felt at home. The Prince barely has any time to come to terms with that information, eyes trailed on him look for hints that this absence of mind wasn't about that sense of longing, before Merlin's face is changed along the lines of mockery and false cheeriness, and only Merlin's smile could look so bright and so fake at the same time.

“Raring to go, Sire.” The raven-haired man retorts, looking to the world like a buffoon and, to him, like he couldn't wish more ardently to be anywhere but here.

He turns, finally, letting out a huff of annoyance and hurt, swallows down the brewing jealousy and walks towards the other side of his chambers with an aching sadness that the morning routine he held so dear and that grounded him during the rest of the day bad been perverted into this agressive, turned tense with secrets thing that left him filled with confusing feelings and a strange sense of yearning.

Today was not going to go well, Arthur could just tell.

* * *

As he's forced in a line along other peasants by Camelot's guards, he catches a glimpse of the bounty hunter of the night before, inspecting them one by one, and he reckons he probably hasn't been hit hard enough by the Raising Sun's sign to have missed the fact there had been two figures when Freya escaped. Judging by the guards either shoving people out of the way or dragging them away under their pleading protests, Gaius had been right: Uther was willing to pay good money for her, and enough to employ part of Camelot's defenses to look for her. 

“Get in line!” The chestnut haired man dressed in Camelot red bellows out to the people behind him, but way to close to his ear, enough to make him cringe.

The bounty hunter shakes his head at a man, that it's not the person he saw, and the man walls freely after a shove of the guards. The next woman in line doesn't have much luck, being dragged away as he nods, her sack falling to the ground as she screams that she's innocent. Merlin swallows a dry sob, but remains firm as one by one the people ahead of him are judged until it's his turn to be presented in front of him.

He tries not to stand to proudly, not to draw too much attention to himself by looking overly brave or defiant or shameless at him, and after a long moment of waiting, the old man shakes his head at Merlin.

“Move along.” Another guard says, a hand to his back pushing him forwards, and Merlin doesn't need to be told twice, walking in quick sure steps, but making enough deviations to his original course that if anyone is following him he will be able to catch up to it instead of leading them to Freya.

He doesn't look back, so he doesn't see when the bounty hunter does when he passes him by.

Merlin enters the tunnels a few minutes later, after doing at least five unnecessary loops to confuse any potential people trailing behind him, walking through the darkened stone with a torch to illuminate his way, the food he had taken from Arthur carefully wrapped in the cloth still held on his head. When he arrives where be had left her the night before, Freya is sleeping, peaceful and quiet and sound in a way he hasn't slept in many months. He kneels by her and hesitates before moving to wake her; her dark hair mingles with the shadows, stands in stark contrast against her pale skin and the red, torn dress she wears, and his jacket is still wrapped around her, this time like a blanket.

“Freya?” He whispers, before he reaches to touch her shoulder gently. Like a frightened animal he shelters from the knights at Arthur's hunts, she startled awake immediately upon his touch, getting on her hand and knees as she crawls away from him, frightened and ready to flee. “It's all right. It's okay. It's me. It's Merlin. And look…” Recognition softens her features, and when fear leaves her eyes, they trail to his hands as he offers her the package in which the food he brought her lies. Freya looks at it, then at him, but doesn't hesitate to stuff the bread and ham in her mouth.

Merlin averts his eyes and goes about setting up candles to their right.

“It's good.” He hears her speak, and his own lips twitch in amusement.

“Believe me, it's fit for a prince.”

He lights the candles with a wave of his hands, feeling the giddy rush of joy that performing magic often evokes on him. The tense look she grants his spellz and the distrustful glance up at him, nevertheless, cut his joy short, and he sits back, arms wrapped in front of his leg, feeling small and unnerving.

”Is that a druid symbol?" He asks when silence grows too heavy and curiosity gets the best of him, indicating the tattoo on her arm, and Freya spares a glance to down to the inked spot of skin before nodding and hiding it with a twist if her arm. “Were you born a druid?”

“Why are you asking me all these questions?”

Merlin's eyes are the one to avert away this time, and he feels something like shame mix with a hurt embarrassment.

“Sorry.” He offers, sheepishly. “I didn't mean to.”

There's a moment's silence in which Freya chews a piece of breath before looking up at him.

“I'm sorry.” She says, but Merlin only shakes his head once, shortly.

“ I understand.”

Her face houses a grin, barely bitter, but deeply sad and alone, before she offers him the phrase he thinks in his mind more often than he would like to admit.

“You could never understand.”

To which he answers with a thoughtful tilt of his head:

“I know what it's like to keep secrets.”

That seems to hold his point to her, because Freya abandons her food to look at him, properly, without fear to her eyes, instead with the growing confidence that the familiarity between them provides her.

“Does anyone know you have magic?”

“Only you. And one other person.” Merlin says, under her brown eyes, before lips twisting in a mirrored version of her smile. “He knows, but I'm not sure he understands."

“I wish I was like everyone else, but…” She comments one more of his daily thoughts, with a wishful curve to her lips, doe eyes downturned once more towards the food.

“You always know, deep down, you're not?” He completes with a knowing tone.

“Because I'm cursed.”

It rings with a certainty that breaks his heart.

”Freya, don't say that.” He pleads, shaking his head gently. ”Magic doesn't have to be a curse. It can be a gift.” The way she glances at him says all that is need to be said about how she hasn't been convinced by earnest words, taking another bite of bread and looking away from him yet again, as if remembering that she's not supposed to look anyone in the eyes or else pain will follow. He sighs, looks around, trying to find words or one of Gaius' many speeches that could prove useful to the situation, but instead he find candles and the spark of his own creatively. “Look.” He calls, and she does as he leans over towards the lit candles. “ _Hoppaþ nu swicae swá lig flíehen_.”

The flames rise from the wax smoothly, raising and floating, dancing around in the air and being reflected on the fire glow that carases her cheek, reflects in her eyes as Freya looks up at them, a delighted smile to her face.

“Beautiful.” She says, and Merlin knows she means it, can see the wonder on her eyes and can't hide his own smile as he wills the flames back on the candles. Gaius knows about his magic, Kilgharrah has often time seem him perform it, but there's never wonder or appreciation for his gifts on their eyes, only a look that seems to say that it was to be expected, as if Merlin himself was not a person, but just a tool through which magic must flow, whatever Camelot's need is.

Speaking of which...

“I have to go.” Merlin says with a heavy heart, head turning towards the tunnels behind them. “Someone might notice I'm missing.” He gazes back at her as he stands, grins at her and offers her his hand. “But I- I'll come back… and I'll bring you some more food. I promise.”

She smiles again, that shy smile that's open and almost trusting despite the fact that the world has been anything but kind to her so far and that he wouldn't judge her if she didn't trust him, magical candle flames or not. Yet, Freya seems like she does, as her hand squeezes his tentatively and she nods, accepting his word and allowing him to go.

The warmth burns again, and it reminds him of wreaking chaos by Will's side, of small jokes shared with Gwen, the way he and Morgana can communicate a thousand words with a mere smirk, but none of them burn enough to compare. He thinks of peaceful excursions with Arthur, days spend in the woods, the familiarity and the way the prince softens when eyes aren't upon him, how Merlin is allowed to the same.

It's almost like that.

* * *

He walks into Arthur's chambers when he's eating dinner; their eyes don't meet, and he knows that Merlin knows he is cross with him, which should be good by all standards, but his servant doesn't seem to pay that any mind because he is equally as cross with him. Dealing with Merlin and his feelings for Merlin is always confusing and exhausting, and so he just focus on eating his drumstick, that has never wronged him or kept secrets or owned beautiful lips he would like to cover with his own or a bravery it had no business having, nor had it warmed it's way into his life and made itself essential and integral to every aspect of it, or had that look to it's beautiful, deep, sky blue eyes as if it wanted something more that Arthur can never offer, craves affection and companionship Arthur can never provide to him under the risk of having his father bring down his sword on it's lean neck until life no longer resides in it's body and joy never flutters again in Arthur's chest and everything inside him shatters at the thought he is to lead a life without his drumstick.

The drumstick was just a drumstick. He could appreciate that.

“Would you like some water with that?”

… But _maybe_ that was the drumstick trying to talk with him again? Truly talk? Were they in better terms all of the sudden and he didn't know? Not that he would look this gift horse on the mouth, but he was fairly sure he has thrown water at the drumstick and that the drumstick had been pissed and wasn't the drumstick cross at him a few seconds ago?

“Mmm.” Is all he answers, nodding appreciatively in-between mouthfuls of meat.

Merlin pouring water never seemed such a long task before, but maybe that's just because he's working the nerve to apologise for earlier in the day (on his own way, of course) and to try and ask him what is on his mind. As the pitcher is almost empty and Arthur's courage is almost at it's higher point, Arthur's knife falls to the floor, probably knocked by his own elbow. And here lies an opportunity to either away from having any form of communication, Arthur contemplates, bending down to pick it up like a bird of prey sinks through the air to grab a rabbit.

When he rises again, with his knife on hand, his confidence somewhat solidified and the words to fix this whole situation ready to slip from his lips, his eyes focus on his plate for longer than necessary, his brows furrow. Something is wrong, with Merlin, yes, but with his plate too. No, he has to focus, he has to remember what he had planned to discuss, and what he says is:

“I had two drumsticks.”

“No you didn't.

“Merlin, I had two drumsticks.”

Somewhere in the world the gods must be banging their heads against a wall because of him, but he doesn't care because he is not crazy and he had two drumsticks.

“Maybe it fell on the floor.” The servants suggests, waving towards the same vague place where his knife had fallen to, and Arthur makes a point to raise his hands in a display of how ridiculous the situation is before leaning to a side to look for his missing drumstick, and upon not finding it, he fixes his eyes once more on his plate and— oh, what the fuck? “I had sausages!”

“You sure?" He asks, and it could almost be a genuine question, but this is Merlin and sure enough he shrugs mockingly. “They must've fallen under the table.”

“Merlin!” He exclaims as the man kneels by the side of his table. This drumstick is not trying to make peace at all, he's declaring war and trying to drive him insane to win it!

“What?" He asks, looking as innocent as he never really is. “You can search me, I haven't taken them.”

Gods know he would like to search him, but not for drumstick and sausages and this is really not the point he should be focusing on.

“Well, where have they gone?” He asks, leaning forwards and aiming for intimidating, but it's like taking a shot of his crossbow to his feet, because Merlin doesn't back off, instead only turns to stars at him and now their faces are closer together than Arthur probably would have control over himself in if not for the fact he's very much angry with this coward's war tactics.

“Strange.” He says, leaning forwards.

“Very.” He answers, now very attentive to not let his breath hitch and betray any emotion.

“Sure you didn't eat them?”

Well, maybe he can show one emotion.

“I haven't had the chance!” Arthur screams in anger, looking from hai servant to the plate that had two drumsticks and three sausages a mere 10 seconds ago.

Merlin holds his gaze for a while, face twisted in something alike confusion but not quite, before twisting his lips in a line that speaks along the line of 'come on now, Arthur'.

“Get out, you and your water!” He orders, giving up any plans of having any form of conversation with him because, unlike drumsticks, Merlin was infuriating.

And he _dares_ to get up with a hop, hands holding onto the watcher pitcher and voice cheery over his shoulders as he marches off towards and through the doors, with a call over his shoulder of:

“I'll just go about my chores then, so when your food magically disappears down your mouth you don't blame me.”

It's only when the door is closed and drumstick is g— Merlin, _Merlin_ is gone once again, that Arthur realizes he had let him win. A curse escapes his lips, and he's marching to the door, throwing it open and looking around the corner, ready to yell at his useless manservant who has no right beating him in anything after he most likely cheated on dice that one time, only to find him gone. He curses once again, and jogs towards where he thinks he might have gone, determined to get to the bottom of this situation. He turns around the halls a thousand times, asks around the servants and has no luck, until he sees from his spot on the stairs, glaring at the courtyard as if it has offended him personally, guards drag Merlin from the lower town towards the direction of the dungeons, Halig in tow.

 _No_ , Arthur thinks, heart seizing in his chest as he watches his gangly servant being carried by the guards, still holding onto that stupid water pitcher until they're out of his view. Only then does the shock wear off and he snaps back into motion, opening the door behind him and setting into a more maddened run than the first through the castle. No, no, _no_.

He's always hated bounty hunters, since he was a boy. Bounty hunters and witch hunters and all kind of hunters that didn't mount a horse and weren't looking to gather food to stock the kitchens, because they always overstepped his father leniency, always abused the trust the King would grant them to do whatever necessary to get their task done. Halig was one of the worst ones, he knew that, loathed him within an inch of his life though he never spoke so out loud, for his father valued him greatly. He remembered being 10 years old and watching a boy, barely older than himself cry as he held onto his crushed arm because the bounty hunter had caught him looking at one of his catches too long and thought they might attempt something that they shouldn't. The only reason Uther hadn't burned the child then when Halig had hinted on him being a magic user too, maybe conspiring with his bounties inside their minds, was because Morgana, a force to be reckoned with since she was old, had argues the case that if he really had been a magic user he wouldn't have allowed himself to be brutalized in that way.

The boy and his family had left the city a few weeks after. He tried not thinking about what happened to them after Gaius did his best to fix his wounded arm and after they packed their small bags and left. Now, he was just trying not to think the state he might find Merlin in.

“Do you know how much money she's worth to me?" He hears the intimidating voice echo in the stairs as he runs down the flight of stairs, and he knows it to be Halig. "More than your life. So I'm asking you again. Have you seen the druid girl?”

“No.” Merlin's voice comes after a moment of silence and then a grunt, what sounds like chains and someone, probably Merlin, hits their backs against must be a chair.

“Hold him.” The man commands as Arthur feet touch the floor of the dungeons. “I think you're lying to me.”

“I'm not!” His manservant argues, sounding way to brave in the face of someone who is not all concerned about the state they might leave him.

“I don't believe you.”

The this door he realises, over the frantic beats of his heart, rushes his steps.

“Halig!” He calls, just in time to halt the bounty hunter as he swings his arm back to punch Merlin, his eyes wander over the state of his servant, scared and held on the chair by two guards, gaze flickering repeatedly from Arthur to Halig and a forceful wave of calm rushes over him. He must sound even and clear headed, every bit the Prince of Camelot that he is, if he wants to get him out of this unscathed. He turns, and walks into the cell with sure steps, his face turned towards Halig, though the man's eyes don't stray from Merlin's face, nor does his fists unclenches even after he has lowered it. “What do you think you're doing?”

“We caught the boy behaving suspiciously, Sire.” He offers as an explanation, and Arthur keeps adding the terrified expression on his servant's face as he shrinks as far away from Halig's reach as the chair and the three pair of hands on him allow him to, he looks at Arthur and shakes his head minutely, as if to tell him he's innocent, as if Arthur would have cared even if he wasn't, before his gaze returns to the man with the mad look upon him that hovers above him.

“Merlin?” Arthur asks, and the fact his voice doesn't either break in anxiousness or betrays his worry is admirable.

“He could be harbouring the girl, and he's gonna tell us where.”

The _how_ doesn't need to be explained, and Arthur imagines for a moment Merlin, laid on this floor, crying as he clung onto his arm, broken in at least three places and bent in a position no arm should ever be. It happens in slow motion, Halig raises his fist once more, pulls back to aim a punch, Merlin seems to steel himself, closing his eyes and waiting for the hit, and before it can happen Arthur hand grabs onto Halig's wrists and pulls him back. 

“Leave him alone." He means to merely say it, but it resounds around the room like a command, and the guards by either of Merlin's side let go of him immediately and he takes a step forward where Halig had been before, his hand wrapping around right above his elbow with more care than he should, pulling Merlin out of the chair, shoving him slightly so he knows to walk towards the door — and though the fool stumbles towards it, he stops to look back at him, to _wait_ for him, as if Arthur is the one in danger here — placing himself between him and the bounty hunter. “Merlin is my servant.” Arthur states, crossing his arms. He feels three time more stern than he really is, sees it in the eye of every man in that room that his words leave not as statements, but written on stone facts that no one should dare speak against. “He has my absolute trust. If you have a problem with him, you come to me.” He takes one step forwards, eyes narrowing, lets his voice drop low as Halig's had, and the threat spills from his lips like honeyed poison does from Morgana's. “Do you understand?

There is a resigned look to his eyes, mad as they are, and fear, and something still that reminds him of being 10 years old and standing in court by his father as he let this man walk out free of punishment. He can see the moment he understands it won't be the same if he attempts anything of the sort against Merlin.

“Sire.” The bounty hunter finally lets out, bowing respectfully at him before turning to walk out. “Goodnight, Merlin.” Halig says, mockingly, stepping into his personal space in a way that has the raven-haired boy pull back in apprehension, and Arthur's eyes narrow. “Don't forget your dinner.”

Arthur's gaze flickers downwards, noticing the meat on the floor as Halig and the guards retreat. His arms are still crossed, so no one but himself will know his hands had been shaking throughout the whole confrontation, and that they still shake now.

“Thank you.” Merlin says, looks at him and then follows his gaze to the mysteriously vanished parts of his dinner lying around Merlin's shoes. “Ah.”

“Are those my sausages?” He asks, a relieved smile playing on his lips, but he holds it back to place both hands on his waist, still playing the intimidating prince part to perfection. Merlin merely nods, letting out a small 'mm' of confirmation. “You took them?"

“To keep you in shape.” He justifies, bowing to pick up the sausages.

It's easier to grin when Merlin is too busy thinking he's in trouble to look at him properly.

“Back to saying I'm fat, are you?”

“No.” Merlin's quick to deny, but then he sees Arthur's smile and his nerves fade away. “Well, not yet.”

“I am not fat!” He argues, not caring a single bit about the meat retrieved from the floor or the offenses Merlin throws at him dressed in pretty silk, only focusing on his own answering grin as he says:

“You see? It's working.”

Then, before he can think of another answer, Merlin leaves once again. Arthur relieved joy fades into confusion; so this wasn't what was on his mind then, he gathers, having almost led himself to believe that Halig has been what had kept Merlin on his toes, and though he seems to have lost the scared edge to him, Arthur reckons that being beaten in a surgeon is not exactly the sort of thing that would make one wistful.

He allows him to go first again, this time standing at the door to take note of where he turns to, pretends not to have any intention of following him or of unraveling his secret.

A heartbeat later, he's fast on his tracks, following him a trail that does not lead towards Gaius' chambers at all, frowning as Merlin leaves the castle and walks through the lower town, presses himself against a wall to evade Merlin's eyes as he glances around cautiously, before diving into an opening on the wall faster than Arthur can blink.

Startled, Arthur jogs towards the spot, recognises it to be one of the tunnels underneath the castle, he walked into the dark like a blind man, walking in circles, listening anything that might hint where his servant. It doesn't make any sense, why would Merlin come here? What could possibly be in the dirty, abandoned tunnels under the castle that would make him feel wistful and Arthur's presence so abhorrent? He couldn't possibly be itching for time alone. On days Merlin wished to be alone, he would pick Gaius' basket and walk to the woods, searching for herbs and the absence of people, and, once or twice — when Arthur had followed him stealthy, concerned about his darkening and curious to find his retreat from the world — he had found him by the same river, feet under the water, wild berries in hands, whistling birdsong at the treetops only to smile when the birds above answered in kind.

The tunnels can't possibly be his new source of joy, without sunlight and mossy trees and water and nature that makes him look like an elven creature, a nymph of the woods, that merely allows Arthur to think of him as a servant and could leave him more than easily if he so felt like it.

He loses him in the tunnels.

He starts growing concerned.

* * *

“I'm sorry I took so long.” Merlin offers, shaking his head apologetically at the sight of her, curled against the wall, eyes red and heavy with tears. She moves to wipe them as he moves to lay down his spoils of the day, places his torch in the usual depression amidst the rocks. “You must be hungry.” He tries, remembering her smile of before, the small hint of happiness and trust at the promise of another care package, turning to offer it to her, but the sadness hasn't waned from her features, still etched in the lines of the tires smile she offers him and in the way she's once again avoiding his eyes. “What is it?”

“Nothing.” Freya denies with a shake of her head.

“But you're upset.”

“No.”

“D'you think I wasn't coming?” He asks, and her silence is confirmation enough that his hunch had been correct. He had given her his word, she had smiled, held his hand, she must have known he would come back. “But I promised you I would.”

There's a pause to her movements, as if she's pondering what to tell him or what not to, before looking up at him, half as if she's still fighting tears of her own.

“I scare most people away.” Freya says, and though her voice sounds light-hearted, Merlin's too familiar with hiding parts of himself, his feelings, his opinions, to not see it for what it is.

“I'm not most people.” He offers, a reassurance that he wouldn't be scared of her and wouldn't leave her, unable to keep his charming smile to himself and being rewarded with a heartfelt one from her. Merlin turns, reaching for yet more candles on his bag to place along the stones, and a spark of pain strikes down from his elbow to his wrist, thanks to the bounty hunter's most thoughtful ministrations. A concerning thought crosses his mind. “How long had you been in that cage?

“A few days.” She replies easily, and his eyes snap to her with an intensity he himself can't quite process.

“And the bounty hunter?"

“Halig.”

“How did he find you?”

She sniffs for a moment, a sad press of her lips as she passes a few bread crumbs from a hand to another, and that lonely feeling Merlin can connect too well with, that he would take from her if he could, and then it all comes crashing down on him, when Freya looks up at him and softly offers:

“You can't always trust people.”

He wants to protect her. He wants her to be safe. More than he usually wants people to be safe when he can't help them, or even when he can and does. It's something that's coiling in the gap between lungs and ribs, near the left side of his breast, that would have had him sit through the worst beating Halig could have came up with and still not say a word.

“I know.” He says, a little breathlessly, a lot in wonder, and leaves his kneeling position in favour of a sitting one, right across from her. “That's why I left home.”

 _You could trust Will_ , a voice offers. _But you couldn't trust the whole village,_ another retorts.

“Where is home?” She asks.

“Ealdor.” He answers, only to receive the same blank expression, as if his home was an invention of his head and no small gathering of pasture in the world has such a name, smiling to himself. “It's a small village. Just a few fields, a couple of cows. Nothing special.”

Her smile seems to disagree.

“My home was next to a lake surrounded by the tallest mountains.” She shares, and he can only smile brighter at the fact she's sharing such information with him, when he hadn't expected her to share a word. “In the winter the storms whipped up the water into waves and you thought they were going to crash down and take away all the houses… But in the summer, wild flowers and light. It was like heaven.”

He can picture it on his mind's eye; bright green grass, small flowers of all colors but always with only four petals, walking by the lake as dragonflies buzzed by. 

“Sounds perfect.”

“It was.”

“Was?”

“My family died.”

“Have you been on your own ever since?” She nods and his heart breaks in that sort of way one's heart breaks when they read tragedies of old or witness a particularly sad love story; he hopes the feeling isn't a bad omen, because he's gathering all the courage he has, feeding it to the warmth in his left breast and setting himself to do something ill advisable. “You're not on your own anymore. I'm going to look after you. I promise.”

“You can't look after me.” Her denial comes quick, a shake of her head, the cloth with food being offered back. “No one can.”

“No, I don't think you understand.” He holds her hand with both of his, looks deep in her eyes when she rises to meet his gaze. _You're not the same,_ the first voice argues, _you have Gaius, and Arthur, and Morgana and Gwen._ The second voice sounds louder and more vicious, cold fingers gripping his heart: _but you can't trust any of them, can you? You still feel alone_. He doesn't.feel alone now, he just feels warm. And hopeful. “I've never known anyone like you.” He confesses, and though the warmth is more intoxicating than the wine he and Gwen drink hidden in the servant's passage when Morgana consciously allows them to slip some of her pitcher away to their delights, self awareness creeps up his neck and he can feel every inch of his palm, as well as every inch of her skin under his and moves to pull his hands away, embarrassed, only for her other to lay over his as if to hold them in place. He feels breathless and disheartened, because time is to short, his duties to many and he would like nothing more than to sit here and hold her forever. His breath leaves him mournfully. “I wish I could stay.”

“You're going?” Freya asks, and the hint of tears to her voice just makes him want to stay more, but all he can do is squeeze her hands, thumbs caressing the back of soft skin.

“We need to be careful.” He explains, willing her to understand. “I'll come back in the morning. You know I will be back, don't you?”

Freya nods, face still wrapped with happiness, and Merlin feels like he's pulling at something too deep inside himself to be named when he pries his hands from hers, wills himself to his feet. _’Can you trust her?_ ’ echoes through his mind as he picks up his torch, whispered by that little poisonous voice he hated so much.

“Merlin.” She calls, and he turns to her, hopeful and willing to stay and curse everything to ashes if she's willing to ask him to. “I've never known anyone like you either.”

 _‘God, I hope so’_ , he thinks.

* * *

Today, he wakes to a normal, full breakfast, the curtains wide open, sunlight shining into his room, his clothing for the day sat on the bed by his side and a guard on his door to tell him of two people found dead in the lower town in the goriest of manners.

No Merlin.

He can't help but find it weird as he dresses by himself — because he is capable of it unlike Morgana likes to think, not because Merlin put aside the easiest to put pieces of clothing — because he had been convinced some of their dynamics would have been restored to it's glory from yesterday's little rescue mission. Not that he had saved him only so the servant would like him again, but it usually was what made them bond together: near death experiences, unnecessary dangers and saving each other's arses. Whatever it was his servant fled towards into those tunnels was consuming his attention more and more by the day; Arthur swore to himself he would discover what it was before the night was over.

Specially, being sat by the two bodies, as peasants flocked around the line of guards that kept them from approaching the scene, his father pacing behind him as Gaius inspected the wounds on the dead, Arthur's eyes kept straying away towards the tunnels. It was too close. Way too close. When had Merlin left? What if the person to be attacked hadn't been two unfortunate townfolk he didn't know, but his secretive, snarky manservant, who was doing God knows what in dirty and dark corridors under the corridors at night?

“I think they've been killed by some kind of wild animal.” Gaius states, bringing Arthur away from terrifying thoughts of Merlin's lifeless corpse under their watchful gaze now, to be inspected and to be still and to rot when soil was thrown over him, and for Arthur to never have a chance to making things up with again.

“Have your men been able to track the creature?”

“That's the strange thing.” He answers his father, standing up to look at him. “Cause the ground is soft, obviously a bear or wolf would leave some mark... But there are no tracks.”

“Then what are these?”

Arthur turns to look at what the physician is indicating.

“Human footprints.”

“But they're leading away from the bodies.” Arthur considers the physician's words and, indeed, whoever had stood there by the murdered couple had walked away from the scene. “Did someone escape the attack?”

Blue eyes rise to take in the surroundings, the general direction of where the person could have gone to, an explanation of why they would flee instead of helping or warning someone. Instead, as per his luck, he catches sight of a known jacket and red neckerchief and his servant, sporting a bright smile, rolling a wheel of bread through the streets far ahead of them.

“No one's come forward.” he mutter, half heartily.

“Could the person who made these be responsible?" His father cuts in, moving to inspect the shape of feet imprinted on the mud with more keen curiosity. Arthur merely feels antsy, ready to leave at any moment.

 _He must be going to the tunnel_ s.

”I don't believe so.” Gaius replies, both leaving him out of the conversation, which Arthur is very thankful for, because he is not paying any attention to their words over the efforts of keeping still and not sprinting towards the opening on the wall he knew Merlin would surely creep through any moment now. “These wounds could only have been inflicted by a beast of considerable size.

“And if this was done by neither a man nor beast, there's only one other explanation.” His father drones out, looking up at him with a warning look that would have frightened him much more if he had not caught a glimpse of Halig walking towards the direction Merlin had a few minute ago. ”It must be the work of a magical creature.

* * *

“What do you want with it?” Merlin's voice echoes in the distance, and he lets himself be guided by him, the cheerful tone to his voice that he has yet to use with him this whole week. “Come on. You can have anything. Ham. Cheese.”

‘ _Who is he talking to?_ ', Arthur wonders, taking steps in the dark, hand brushing against the wall so he won't get lost. A torch could have given him away to his manservant, announce someone was coming maybe, and then his one chance of finding out what he had been riding would skip through his fingers and he couldn't have that. He needed to understand Merlin, he craved to, like one would to a good book with way too many riddles on it or to the reason behind a yearning gleam to blue eyes.

“Strawberries.” A woman's voice replies, quieter and sadder, but still fond and likely entertaining Merlin's charade.

A girl. That's the secret business Merlin is hiding in the tunnels, that steals his thoughts when he's anywhere but in here with her. A girl. Something in Arthur threatens to break, and that sensation makes something green eyed rise from the depths of himself. Still, Arthur's brows furrow for another reason entirely: try as he may he cannot put a name or a face to that voice; not that he knows many of the women Merlin interacts with, but in his mind's eyes they are harrowed to two: Gwen and Morgana. And that is neither Gwen nor Morgana, so maybe she's another servant? Or someone from the lower town? Curiosity gets the best of him as always, and as Merlin declares “Strawberries it is” he stops by the arch of stone that leads into where the happy couple are gathered, and peeks his head around the corner furtively to catch a glimpse of Merlin, clearing his throat and rubbing his hands together before placing them both together, arms stretched in front of him.

He speaks a single word that he can't quite figure out, maybe in a language Arthur doesn't know, and that half a second later, he realises, no one should know within the borders of Camelot unless they wanted to burn for it, as the blue of Merlin's eyes gives way to the briefest and brightest flash of gold. _Magic._ His mind halts and his breath stops and he takes steps back, silent despite his shock or maybe due to his shock, until his back hits the wall behind him, and he keeps looking horrified to the boy who has no idea he is here. His mind works a thousand thoughts in a second, none of them particularly pleasant.

Merlin has magic, so therefore he must be evil. Merlin, the man with too large ears and blue eyes and not a single drop of respect for his position as prince of Camelot, that is always too snarky and lazy and never where he is supposed to be, who apparently spends days on end in the tavern without knowing the name of it's owners or a single one of their barkeepers, who looks at him as if he is the most golden thing he has ever beholden and the most annoying man he has suffered through knowing, who walks about the palace with snark and kind words and too bright smiles, who sneaks candies to children and helps Gwen with her chores and gives Morgana's flowers and teaches the youngest and squire-less knights how to properly sharpen their own swords and that had Arthur wrapped around his thumb without knowing it, is an evil sorcerer who wants nothing but to warp his mind and must die for his unknown but surely existent crimes.

Or maybe Merlin is learning magic, maybe it's a recent development. Maybe a three days long development he takes to learning on the tunnels under the castle so he won't burn for it. He likes that explanation best, likes the deniability that his best friend, the man he fell in love with would have lied and hid from him for all this time, would have stood by his side and schooled his face into a mask after all the burnings and executions he was forced to attend to by his side, that the loss of that lively spark to his gaze was not the endless times Arthur had gone on about the evils of magic and the wickedness of it's users, of filling his goblet to the brim with wine in feasts thrown in honour of the purge, of the fear of living in his father's court knowing anyone and everyone in there including Arthur — _including Arthur?_ — would not hesitate to light a match and let him burn if he risked being known.

Outside the whirlwind of the storm of his thoughts, Merlin opens his hands to reveal a red rose. His face contorts sheepishly and the girl in front of him grants him a smile.

“That's not a strawberry.”

Is she a sorceress too? Is she the one teaching him these things? She's surely not dressed like a servant of Camelot, nor like a peasant of the lower town, so perhaps she's too blame.

“Er, it's the right colour.” Merlin offers, playful and light, and smiles in that way that breaks Arthur's heart all over again, because he will have to stand and see that face _burn until it's ashes_ , bowing his head and offering her the red rose instead.

If he was not shocked beyond belief and questioning the last year of his life, he would laugh. He would laugh so much he would seem unhinged, would laugh until his eyes welled with tears and until his tears salted the ground under Camelot, until sorrow and desperation and whatever else was that feeling that made his lungs feel like they could burst at any time, like he had been skewered, left him and imprinted itself on these walls, so no living would would dare come here again, so these tunnels would be forever a shrine to Merlin's betrayal and Arthur's heartbreak and so that he knew, everytime he walked on the halls of the castle, slept in his room, thought about trusting someone, he would remember he had already learned his lesson of what it was like to know that trust was misguided.

He would have to burn Merlin in a stake because of a rose. Merlin was evil and magic and deserved to die because he created a rose and smiled that smile that broke his heart and offered the rose to the girl Arthur still didn't know, that took it with the same smile from before and Merlin laughs.

All because of _a fucking rose_.

“Why are you so good to me?” She asks, and Arthur listens because he can't make himself leave. Can't make himself run up the steps and call the guards either.

“Because I can't help it. I don't know.” Merlin say, leans against the rock behind him, averts his eyes, shrugs helplessly and takes in the courage to break a little more of Arthur's heart. “I like you.” Arthur sucks in a breath and feels his eyes burn, he bows over himself as it he had been punched. “With you I can just be who I am. We don't have to hide anything. We don't have to worry.”

That's what he has to offer to him, he realises, trying to push down the emotions that want to explode up at him, like a volcano that would have him crumbling in no time if left to it's own devices. The girl's words fall in dear ears, as time stretches once again to force suffering upon Arthur. It's what he has made life be to him: hiding, worrying, fear, death. How could he have expected him to love him back, when Arthur's first thought when seeing him for who he really was had been that he was evil, that an execution was in order?

And he _dared_ to think he loved him.

His head snaps up towards the sound of approaching people just as Merlin turns towards it, heart missing a beat.

“They must've followed me.”

Or followed Arthur, he thinks bitterly to himself as he leaves his spot, open and visible to the intruders and hides in an alcove merely two steps to his left. He had tried to be careful, he had tried to be the most careful he could be, but he had all but ran out from his father and Gaius and the bodies, desperate to know what Merlin had been hiding. Now he wishes he had let his secrets be, saved himself some heartbreak. Halig and two guards walk into the space Merlin and his mystery girl had been in merely a moment ago, and Arthur fears being found out by how loudly his heart is beating.

Arthur eyes search them through the dark, until he catches on their shadows now that their own torch has been put out, knows he only found them because he knew where to look, sees the way Merlin straightens, how his chest puffs as if he's waiting for a fight, preparing for it, and it's too much like what he looks like when he thinks Arthur's life is danger for him to stomach, because it's also so much more than that. He's ready to be beaten by Halig for this girl, willing to hide her and steal food and candles for her, and now he's ready to fight and, most likely, die for her — and Arthur has lost him in more ways than one, should step forward, tell the guards of Merlin and his magic, see him burn, but the same urge of protectiveness that had him racing towards the dungeons still has it's hold around his soul. He can't let any harm come to Merlin. Halig approaches closer to where they're hiding and Arthur's mind finally spasms out an idea, picks a small rock laid on the floor and throws it upwards the stairs.

He creeps from his spot when steps hurry up the stairs and away from the tunnels, to watch as scarlet cloaks and the light of a burning torch retreat, and thinks of how to finally get Halig to leave before he finally has Merlin cornered in a moment he can't save him. Then the crying starts, quick panicked breaths and scared teary, little hitched intakes of air and Merlin's soft voice murmurs another word in the tongue that is a crime to know and a small fire comes to life, the light of a candle.

“They're going to find me.” The girl speaks, terrified and not making much sense. “I can't go back in that cage, I can't.”

She's the druid girl. She's the druid girl the guards are looking for. A girl with magic, brought in chains and brought in a cage like an animal that Merlin probably helped escape. Halig did have the right man, then. _Idiot_ , he thinks, not sure if of himself or Merlin, _soft hearted idiot_.

“Shh.” He soothes her, gentle and warm and reassuring. “I won't let that happen. I promised you I'd look after you, and I will. No matter what.” The words are nothing like the sort of things he says to Arthur when he dares to be anything other than his snarky disrespectful self, but still they drive him forward, like siren song lures sailors to their deaths. The prince aches to hear them, to have him hold his hand and speak such things to him alone, wishes he was not the heir of a Kingdom built in the blood of Merlin's people, the druid girl's people, but someone who could be held by him, protected by him, loved and trusted by him. “You really don't realise how special you are, do you?

Arthur was sure that no, she didn't realise it, and that just made him resent her even more, through the afterwaves of shock and denial and hurt and loss, through grappling with the facts Merlin was a sorcerer to the fact he loved someone, deeply loved someone by the looks of it, and that someone wasn't Arthur, but the girl Halig was about ready to kill half of the lower town for. She won him over; this druid girl, in ripped clothes, with a target drawn on her back, too shy to look up, to frightened to move, had won Merlin over in the battle of affections he had been fighting for twin years now on. He had feared to lose him to Morgana's for so long, fretted over Guinevere for a moment that had drawn out in an eternity when he had gotten word that she had kissed him after he recovered thanks to the flower _Arthur_ retrieved — by all means, that kiss ought to have been _his_ — with no little risk to his life, suspected of any and everyone whom he graced with a smile, and though he had held him as close as he could dare, this girl had bested him in three days.

“You're not scared of me?” She asks, and Merlin might not be frightened of her, but Arthur is terrified, and for reasons that have nothing to do with magic. His feet still in a spot he can see them without being seen. Both that they would care to look for him, with the way they look at each other, like they can't decide with half of the pair hung the prettiest stars on the sky.

“Being different is nothing to be scared of.” Merlin replies.

Arthur watched because he must love pain, watches because there are still parts of his heart unbroken and yearning for a love he cannot have, watched because he cannot turn away as the dark haired head inches closer and closer in the most timid of ways to hers, face nearing face. As Merlin leans down to kiss the druid girl's lips, Arthur hands rises to cover his mouth and hold back his sobs.

He can turn away now, can crouch by the alcove he had been hidden before and try and tune out the scene behind him, the small elated breaths, the hopefulness they bring. He can crouch, fall to his knees, cry silently, feel the shards of his heart cut him from the inside out.

He can't have him.


	2. ⳺ with a sword⍮

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Arthur knows about the girl in the tunnels with Merlin's heart in her hands, knows that the man he lost his own heart to has magic and knows about their plan to run away and live the romance of a lifetime, knows he will be alone. So it's up to the fates to decide if it was fortunate or unfortunate that the bastet came along.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "The most terrible thing about it  
> is not that it breaks one's heart,  
> hearts are made to be broken but  
> that it turns one's heart to stone."
> 
> — 𝘖𝘴𝘤𝘢𝘳 𝘞𝘪𝘭𝘥𝘦.

Arthur drinks more heavily than usual that night during dinner; not enough for his father to notice, but unfortunately heavily enough that Morgana gives him concerned looks, face devoid of any teasing, and Guinevere looks at him from behind her mistress's spot, confused and arches a demanding brow for explanations when her focus turns to Merlin. The manservant for his part, doesn't notice anything between the three of them, face contorted in the efforts of hiding a smile, tapping his fingers gently against his right in the rhythm of the song the bard sings to entertain the court, almost humming along with the lady's voice.

He had always paid little to no attention to the matters of court, considering them a great bore, sometimes almost falling asleep while standing when the dinners were particularly uneventful and the singer exceptionally dull, but not once in all these occasions, had he missed the slight changes to Arthur's humour or spirits, often going out of his way to tend him in things he didn't need just so he could give him a reassuring glance, or bump his arm with his. Knowing he is so easily forgotten at the heels of the druid girl just makes it all hurts even more, his smile and explicit joy a stark contrast to Arthur's gloomy behavior.

A wave of applause rises above them when the Lady Hildergard finished yet another ballad, bowing to the praise with a glowing smile before drawing a deep breath that fills her lungs with air for yet another song as the players start the rhythm for the last ballad of the night; he hears Merlin’s delighted gasp at recognising the tune at the same moment he groans miserably into his glass of wine.

“Arthur, are you alright?” Morgana asks in a hushed whisper, leaning towards him with inquisitive eyes and brows furrowed together in that brand of concern that would surely sour the back of his throat when be watched it turn into pity if he was to be honest with his feelings.

_‘ Thy smile is like a breath of spring,_

_thy voice is soft like summer rain,_

_and I cannot compete with thee, Jolene._ ’

“I am perfectly well, Morgana.” He says, voice bitter in spite of the alcoholic sweetness to his tongue as he lowers the goblet to the table, glaring resentfully at the noblewoman singing below to the smiles and cheers of all. “Why do you ask?”

The expression she fixes him with is disbelieving and chiding and nothing near the pity he fears she could harbour if he were to tell. It reminds him that Morgana is above else a wilful woman who would have first threatened him with a knife to make sure he wouldn't harm Merlin and only second think of the emotional turmoil he would go through; he wouldn't die from a broken heart, and her soft heart would rather tend to his than gather her friend's ashes for a clandestine burial in the outskirts of town.

“Because you look as if you're eating stale food and as if that wine is the most bitter thing you ever drank.” She says, and he had almost forgotten to hear her reply. He makes a show of putting down his goblet, glaring sideways at her, but where most would flinch or at least avert their eyes, Morgana merely reflects his own glare at him and send him scowling.

It's not bitter, it's just too sweet. And it's hard to swallow the wine now that Morgana called his attention to it, sweet as it is: like mother's supposed personality, like the words Morgana speaks before she strikes, like Merlin's concerned fussing, like the druid girl's smile, like poison.

_‘ He talketh of thee in his sleep_

_And alas, I cannot keep from weeping_

_when I hear this name, Jolene. ’_

Arthur follows his manservants' path with his eyes, as he fills the goblet to the brim for an excuse to leave him, as he smiles at Morgana's maidservant, as he dances his way through the servants, and smiles and hums along to the song most likely if the movements of his throat are anything to go by. _‘He won't come back’_ , he thinks, _‘at least, not tonight’._ He has no reason to stay here then, and listen to ballads about women who drive men to fall in love with them and lead them away from those who have none but them.

“You are right.” He agrees with Morgana, over his wine. He drinks it to the last drop, hopes that it's poison, hopes that he dies; he doesn't. The gods are cruel and he still has hope in the corners of his soul a wiser man wouldn't have allowed to creep in there. Arthur stands, Morgana's brows furrow, his father fixes him with a disapproving gaze. “I am not well, Father, forgive me. I'll retire to my rooms for the night.”

The silence stretches for so long he fears for a moment that he will be ordered to stay.

“Call Gaius if you need to.” Uther dismisses.

“At least wait for Mer—”

“Goodnight, Father. Morgana."

He leaves before anyone else can say anything, and holds himself together just right to not stumble as he makes his way towards the door, waves Leon and the Knights away, takes firm steps towards the door, out in the deserted courtyard, through the least populated streets and then places a hand against the stonewall of the castle until he finds the passage to duck into for the tunnels. Hildegard's voice chases him out of the castle nevertheless, fading progressively, and mocking him with her lyrics.

_‘ Thou couldst have thy choice of men,_

_but I could never love again._

_He is the only one for me, Jolene. ’_

He can only briefly wonder, as his feet guide him towards the same spot from before, what is that Merlin has that makes him so willing to be stupid for a smile, to hurt himself to try and cut it off 

”What are you doing here?" The druid asks, and Arthur could have asked the same, both to Merlin and to himself.

Why had he followed him? Surely he had not had wine enough to rob him of all his good sense, and he didn’t have the excuse of wanting to know where he fled to to make things acceptable; he was only following him around, like a spurned lover, trying to live through the whispers that echoed in the tunnels in attempts to fill with fantasies the hollowness to his chest, and that felt rather pathetic for a Prince of Camelot.

Still, he stays there, leaning against the tunnel in the shadows and cold, listening to whispers like ‘I couldn't help it’ and ‘It's dangerous’ and ‘I don't care’ and ‘No, Merlin, you have to be careful’. He lays his head against the rock wall, cool and steady, closes his eyes so the world stops spinning around him, and the words echo in his mind, and Merlin says he's fed up with being careful, he's fed up with all of this, he's fed up with _him_ too most likely. He snaps his eyes open as he declares he will get the girl out of Camelot, heart beating painfully against his ribcage with a traitorous sort of hope.

“How?” The girl asks, an echo of Arthur's thoughts.

“I'll get you some clothes, disguise you. What's wrong?”

“It's just, I'm going to miss you.”

Arthur sure wouldn't.

If she was gone, the yearning would fade from Merlin's eyes, the smiles would come back and they would be for him, not for this witch in the tunnels, Merlin would be playful again and there would be that spark of mischief and they could go hunting and Merlin could spend hours ranting about how terrible hunting was and they could go right back to—

“No, you won't, because I'm going to come with you.”

 _What_? His nails dig into stone and stone digs under his nails. His eyes are no longer closed, wide open in panic, but the dark doesn't change. Arthur didn't realise he had been smiling at the idea of the girl leaving until that rug was pulled from under his feet.

“What?”

“I told you I'm going to look after you.”

“You can't.” _He really couldn't_ . “Don't say that.” _Yes, Merlin, don't say that_.

“It's not what you want?”

_It is most definitely not._

“Merlin, you have a good life here.” Arthur found himself nodding along to that statement. He had a good life here, _with Arthur,_ he couldn't leave at a moment's whim. His fingers keep scratching the stone, he's no less upright, the stone isn't failing him, but his knees are week and his breath is hitching. He's already been disillusioned from the fact Merlin could ever love him back, now he has to have him leave him? He doesn't want to, he can't. “My life is… I have to keep moving, always looking over my shoulder, people chasing me.”

“Then we'll go somewhere no one knows us. Somewhere far away.” If he had asked him this to him, would Arthur throw it all through the window? Damn Camelot and keep Merlin, as he claimed he wanted to? The scratching stops. “You haven't given me your answer.”

“I want that more than anything.” The druid answers with the same words Arthur whispers against the cold stone. It's impossible not be jealous of her, but he doesn't want to resent her, doesn't want to hate her. She's just the lucky one between the two of them. “Where will we go?”

“Somewhere with mountains.”

“A few fields.”

“Wild flowers.”

“A couple of cows.”

“And a lake.”

“And a lake.” She agrees.

There is a comfortable, wishful silence amidst them as Arthur remains in the dark, thinking of a cottage by hills that became snowy in winter and covered in wild flowers on spring, a lake of pure deep blue, with fields to tend to and cows to own and Merlin, hand on his, to sleep laid side by side with every night. He draws a deep breath that sounds too much like the beginning of a sob, before gripping the stone of the walls and making his way out of the tunnels as fast as he possibly can, as far away from this life he is not allowed as possible. Drunk as he is, Arthur stumbles into his room — cold and strangely hollowed, numb from the deepest spot inside his ribcage to the tips of his fingers — climbed into his bed, still clothed, still with a - hurt he couldn't let out, turned into the left side of his way too big bed with way too expensive sheets on a way too cold castle. 

Nothing like a cozy cottage in-between mountains, by lakeside, with cows, wild flowers and Merlin to share his life with.

He doesn't sleep that night.

* * *

When Merlin meets with Arthur (or rather, almost bump noses with him, from how close the ass stopped into his personal space) in the hallway in the middle of his strategic retreat from Morgana's rooms and Gwen's questions, burgundy dress in hands, inspecting the fabric closely, he wasn't much sure what to expect. His interactions with the prince were rather scarce this last few days, with that unknown sadness that had mysteriously creeped behind the Prince's blue eyes and the own hot ball of guilt and shame in the bottom of his stomach when faced with the man destiny had bound to him — _the other half of his coin_ — and that he was planning to abandon in two nights time for a shot of happiness for a change. 

Here's what he got: Arthur looked at him for a few seconds that stretched too long in his mind's eyes, flickered his gaze to his lips, then to his chest and finally down to the dress and while at that, he blinked, a couple of times, frowned in confusion and walked past him. One would assume that's all, the end of it, but five steps later the prince stopped, turned around, frowning even more as if he had just come to the conclusion that no, he could not make sense of this in his head and asked:

“What are you doing?” Which he was really hoping he didn't have to answer because he could not just say everyone would be running around naked to Arthur and expect it to stick. Woodworm was becoming sort of a traumatic thing for him, not that he could blame him, given how he terrorised him with it.

“Er… Running an errand for Gaius.”

A golden brow arches.

“For Gaius?” Arthur asks, skeptically.

“Yes.”

He's still unconvicted, seeming to all the world as if he's chewing something bitter or still having the rotten taste of Gaius' potions to the back of his tongue, playful demeanor undercut with that guarded hurt that had came out of nowhere.

“Strange.”

Yes, it was strange! Thank you, Arth— oh, he was talking about the dress… That be said was an errand… for Gaius… Gods be good, he was terrible at this. Merlin does his best to force out a laugh in this incredible awkward situation they have going on.

“Oh, I don't think it's for him.” He excuses away, trying to salvage his mentor's reputation, and Arthur's eyes sharpen with resentment. What is happening with him?

“As long as you do a decent day's work, Merlin, that's all I care about.” He says, and his voice sounds the same and he's still smiling like the arsehole he never stopped being no matter how occasionally nice he could be, but nothing is right about it, and the sense of wrongness increases when he turns from him as fast as he can, eager to go about his way and to put distance between them.

And this is wrong in so many levels, because Arthur is trying to avoid him.

“No, no.” He finds himself saying, taking steps forwards to close the distance, still smiling and still nervous and still trying to explain himself away. “It's not for me.”

Arthur turns, not without taking another two steps between them for safety, hands outstretched up in either surrender from the argument or to make sure Merlin keeps his distance, he's not sure, but he d _oesn't understand_.

“What a man does in his spare time is completely up to him.” He says, and seems to catch himself on his unusual behavior because he tries to make it humorous, joins his hands in a soft clap and jokes.

“No, you— you've got this wrong!” He says, sure that if he can get the banter going just a little longer he can ask what's happening to him, figure out what's wrong.

But Arthur's already turned away and he's already at the end of the hall and he is just slippery to hold, determined to put distance between the both of them in that manner that has Merlin wanting to question him out of hurt or to scream out if frustration.

“Colour suits you, Merlin.” He hears the prince say over his shoulder at him, eyes carefully avoiding to look at him and a sad excuse of a smile to his face before he turned the corner.

If he feels a little more guilty at that — _wants to follow Arthur and ask what's wrong, tell him he won't leave, promise anything and everything it takes for that blasted sadness to leave his eyes and for him to laugh a genuine laugh_ — he's sure spending time with Freya will make take such a feeling from the forefront of his mind, make it all worth it.

Fingers digging in the expensive fabric of the dress, he turns around and makes himself leave.

* * *

Another night has passed and another day has come and Arthur's still thinking about the dress and the girl when the meeting with his father and the Court Physician comes round, their words muffled by the hurt of his heartbreak and he itches for a moment where he is not needed so he can slip away, trail the path down to under the cells, into the caves and old stone that few knew of and even fewer dared to go to, to live vicariously through loving whispers.

“The beast has struck again?” His father asks, fast approaching and luring him back to blood and gore and the seriousness of the situation. Arthur tucks away those feeling and those thoughts safely away and resigns himself to be the dutiful prince, paying extra attention to Gaius' answer.

“I'm afraid so.” Gaius replies, covering the bodies with the sheets. He sure would have appreciated if he had extended him that kindness, but he supposes it will be only his father that will sleep without seeing the mangled corpses. “The wounds match those of the previous victims.”

He approached from the opposite side his father had, with the only witness' words fresh in his mind and more two corpses to his conscience — two guards, good men, that he might have saved if he spent more time focusing on the serial murdering of his people instead of his ill-fated not-even-a-full-love affair with his magical seventy. “The man who saw it spoke of a huge black cat with wings.” He declares, and doesn't miss the prensive look Gaius shoots at him under that description.

“I was right.” Father says, turning away from him. “This is not the work of a natural creature.”

”Are there any tracks this time?”

”Just human footprints again.”

“Can you identify this monster?”

“I will need more time to investigate.”

“Oh, come on. You always have theories in these matters.”

“This time, Sire, I prefer to wait till I'm certain.” The old physician declares, and attempts to walk away under his Father's frantic look — the one he always gets when magic is mentioned, the one that makes Arthur wonder if he's fully sound of mind, if the best parts of him didn't die with his mother — and Arthur's worried one. Something in the way he says it makes Arthur worry. It's bothersome that his first instinct while worried is to glance back to where Merlin should be standing.

“There is no time to waste, Gaius.” Father barks, like he's thirsty to spill magical blood like a man wandering the desert would be thirsty for water; no, like a drunkard thirsts for another pint. It's an acquired taste.

“I'll report back to you before the day's out, Sire.”

Gaius leaves, father curses, Arthur looks at the bodies and can only think of Merlin. He closes his eyes, massages his templed, nods when Father orders him some more and hunched his shoulders a little before dismissing his guard. He walks towards the castle, towards the outside walls, his palm rests against stone and he trails the path to heartbreak just once more and hopes this is the last 'once Moe's he'll put himself through. When he finally reaches them in the tunnels, it's to be greeted with Merlin's voice, working the words “You look like a princess” in affection and wonder to rival his most reassuring speeches to Arthur before tournaments or fights. He will miss that time, he realizes as he sits in his corner and quietens to listen. 

“I'm not.” She says, and her words echo back to him more harsh than sad. He frowns. “I can't take this.”

“Freya, I don't understand.”

“You keep doing all this for me. I don't deserve it.” That's a feeling he can sympathize with, something he can understand and latch onto so he won't hate her for how she turns down every tentative attempt of kindness and love Merlin offers her, always so gentle and sweet.

“I want to. What's wrong?”

“Nothing.”

“Here. Please. You'll look wonderful in it.” He's probably offering the dress again, and by the silence she's not taking it. He clings more tightly to the fact she thinks she doesn't deserve his love, that she doesn't understand why he does the things he does for her, like stealing Arthur's breakfast or drinking from a poisoned goblet to spare him, holds it so tight his knuckles go white. ”We can leave tonight as soon as it gets dark and we'll be together.”

Tonight? It's a lot sooner than he expected, but then again, did he think Merlin would leave this girl to live in fear and in the dark, under the castle as his father's men hunted her to be burned? Merlin is not like that _, Arthur is_ . Selfish and uncaring and greedy, like a child that wants to keep a bird that should by all accounts be free _(he still wishes Merlin would stay)_.

“We'll need supplies.” The girls says, and he nods as if his input mattered in this conversation. “Food, water.”

“All right. I'll try to get horses, and we'll need blankets, but that's all we'll need.”

Arthur would make sure that Merlin's favoured mare would be casually easier than usual to slip out of the stables, maybe with the gentle horse that took to any squire and knight with an apple on their hands, and two saddles with provisions packed. Lord only knew Merlin wouldn't question, the man never questioned a thing

He'd leave and be happy with her with cows and a lake, marry even, maybe have children. The gods know that Merlin deserves to be happy, Arthur does too, and he had once too many thought to himself he would have done anything to grant him such happiness to shut away from his vows now that his happiness wasn't directly entangled with his own.

“Go on, go.”

“I won't be long.”

The sound of another kiss hangs on the air above them and Arthur closes his eyes as if he would have rather been stabbed; he did it to himself, really. He listens to Merlin leave and it's like his heart is breaking.

“Goodbye, Merlin.” The druid girl whispers into the cave, lets her soft nothing of a voice echo through the stone and through Arthur's heart as he lets out a defeated breath, leans his head back against the cold hallway in which he leans on.

He would let him leave, if that's what he wanted. Would let him go to somewhere Arthur could never follow and live the happy, simple life Arthur could never have with someone else.

Arthur struggles in a breath, feels a tear slip from his eye and trail down his cheek, wiping his eyes with his sleeve, composing himself as he turns to trail the steps back up to his own chambers.

 _Goodbye, Merlin_.

* * *

He drops the small pack he's been dumping useful things in for when Freya and him are on the run upon hearing the door open and the heavy steps of his mentor. Luckily for him, he's somewhat better at making up excuses to his mentor than to the Prince of Camelot when under pressure.

“Gaius, I was just…”

“Merlin, sit down. I want to talk to you.”

 _Oh_. Well, that bode well for the conversation, didn't it?

“Is everything alright?” Absolutely fantastic way to start the talk, his eyes go from the door to Gaius at least a dozen times as he slides his bag under the table with his foot stealthy before sitting on the workbench with him. “You look worried.”

“The beast struck again last night. There are two more deaths in the lower town.”

Something in him, near the guilt of abandoning his destiny and Camelot and Arthur, gets a little more heavier, and he thinks of a cottage by a lake and Freya smiling as she tends to one of their cows. He would abandon Camelot to a man-killing threat, most probably magical and that he hadn't even bothered to look for. He had been too busy in the tunnels. Arthur was the one doing the more heavy searching this time, without Merlin to work some of the strings behind his back to help him along, and now eight people were dead. Maybe that's why he was sad earlier.

“Do you know what it is yet?” He asks, hopeful that maybe he can fix this one last problem before he leaves, before night comes. He doesn't learn that he's never that lucky. Gaius tells him there were no tracks around the bodies, tells him of the human footprints leading away from them, how nothing makes sense, and Merlin's mind splits, half trying to remember the creatures of the old books by the corner and half making peace with the fact that maybe Camelot should fix their own messes for a change. “Right”, he mumbles, eyes drifting away, until the spot in the floor he's fixated on seems as dubious as the rest of his world and no answers come from the piece of tile.

Arthur should fix his own messes. It's unfair that Merlin was born to guarantee that he's alive and safe and happy at the expense of his own life and safeness and happiness.

So why does he want?

“It doesn't seem to add up.” Gaius voice continues, cutting through his turmoil like a welcomed distraction of the too many questions suddenly surging through him. “The footprints would indicate a human was responsible, but the wounds inflicted are definitely the work of some kind of beast.”

“Strange.” He agrees, half heartedly.

“Yes. Until I remembered what Halig said about the druid girl.” _Freya._ Merlin's breath threatens to get stuck in his throat, but he keeps breathing normally, turns his face towards him as if that combination of words means nothing. Gaius stares at him, benevolent but firm, as if he's urging Merlin to understand something that Merlin doesn't quite know yet. “That she's cursed.”

“What's that got to do with the monster?” He's scared to ask, but he's also scared of not knowing.

“The ancient chronicles speak of a heinous curse. It dooms its victim to turn at the stroke of midnight into a vicious, bloodthirsty beast. The writers of old called this creature a Bastet: a monster of nightmare that inhabits the twilight world between the living and the dead.” It couldn't be Freya, Freya was kind and gentle and scared. Sure, she was terrified and crying every morning he went to her, but who's to say she hadn't heard the creature outside, thought she would die instead and heard the screams of the villagers? It couldn't be Freya, not the girl he loved and that he was running away with in the night. “Merlin, I want the truth.” Gaius leans closer to him, and he's still kind, still soft spoken and gentle and treating Merlin like he was a cornered animal ( _wasn't he?_ ), trying to make eye contact with him but Merlin wouldn't look anywhere but the floor, brows furrowing. It couldn't be, Gaius was just wrong. He doesn't meet Gaius' eyes and a sliver of iron creeps into the old man's voice instead. “Did you release the druid girl from the cage?”

_Yes._

“Of course not!”

Silence stretches between them, and he knows he's disappointed, knows that he expected the truth, he obviously knows it. He can't tell him of Freya, not when he thinks she's a monster. He can't tell him he's leaving either, or else he wouldn't let him go.

“There was a time when you thought twice before lying to me.”

 _There was a time I thought you wouldn't have thought twice to turn your back on me if I was caged too._ So what's the damage if a little iron creeps in his voice too?

“I did what was right.”

“You know the creature and the girl are one and the same.”

“You're wrong.” _He must be._ “Freya is just a girl.” _I am just a boy._

_We don't deserve to die because you assume the worst of us, we don't._

“Merlin, please think about what I'm saying. You know it is the truth. Where is she now?”

He wanted to kill her.

Gaius wanted to kill her.

If Merlin became a threat to great to be manageable, would he kill him too?

“No.” He replies, shaking his head. He's not sure if he's answering Gaius or the poisoned whispers in his mind.

“She's killed already, and she'll kill again.” He shakes his head against his words, against the meaning of them, begs to all that is holy that Gaius will just stop talking and see reason. She didn't kill anyone. Freya didn't kill anyone, she was good. “She can't stop herself.”

“Please, Gaius.” He asks, but for what? For him to see reason? For him to give her a chance? For him to see if such a curse can be broken, if she's truly is cursed? For him to not turn his lips downwards in reproach and stand to leave? For him to not go where he thinks he is? He stands too, tears welling in his eyes and panic clawing at his throat. “Where are you going?”

“To Uther.”

He doesn't even turn.

He knows Uther will kill her.

 _He_ _doesn't even turn_.

“I'm begging you! Just give me some time to get her out of the city, please.”

At least he turns now, a hand in the door, face towards him, but Merlin isn't sure if he would have rathered he hadn't turned. There's no mercy in his eyes. He's not going to give him any time, he's not going to spare her, he _'s going to tell Uther, he doesn't care—_

“I'm sorry. I can't let more innocent people die.”

Merlin shakes his head at him, tries to hold back the tears and the sharp bitter stab of betrayal. Gaius leaves. That's what happens to threats in Camelot, that's how Gaius survived the purge, that was why Merlin was still alive. He was like a tamed dog, to be put down at the vaguest hint of rabidness; while he was using his powers in the favour of all, Gaius would keep his mouth shut and pretend his eyes were closed and would even teach him a spell or too… but what would happen if he showed any of teeth? _He would,_ he thinks, _he would kill you too, if you became too much of a threat._

He would find a way for Freya's curse himself, if that was the case. He grabs his packed bag, blinks past the blurriness of tears and storms past the door. He thinks he hates him, Gaius, now. He wasn't any better than Uther, he was never any better than him, selling magic users like bargaining chips and watching them burn to keep himself safe. He wasn't any better, and he wouldn't spend his life slaving after a kingdom that feasted after slaughtering druids, not even for Arthur. He would miss him, and Morgana and Gwen, but he wouldn't spend his life like this.

Camelot could fix it's own messes. At least Freya wouldn't burn him for thinking this.

Her dress was in the floor, surrounded by the candles he has left her. Freya wasn't in the tunnels when he came for her, wasn't there when he screamed for her or looked for her or begged her to appear, promised he wouldn't judge her, that they could leave and she could have a chance.

So he repaid Gaius his kindness — sat on the floor by the dress, buried his face in his arms and cried — and wasn't there when he came to his room either.

* * *

He hadn't seen him the whole day; _Arthur hadn't seen Merlin the whole day_. He asked Guinevere and she didn't know where he was either, hadn't seen him since yesterday, he had no reassuring answer to when Morgana frowned from behind her maid and asked if something was the matter with Merlin, but she hadn't been there, in the councilroom when Gaius announced the druid girl was the beast, hadn't heard him say she was cursed, hadn't frozen in her seat and looked for Merlin all through the room and through the castle and he couldn't go to the tunnels now or it would be suspicious.

 _What if he came back in the night?_ Had Merlin been with her when she turned? Had he known? Was he dead or did he breathe still? Would Arthur feel glad to strike the beast down if he found no other solution this time, knowing it to be a scared girl who liked strawberries and wasn't frightened of Merlin's magic and had so surely stolen him from Arthur that only her death would make him stay? Was he a bad person?

Guinevere asks if he wasn't helping Gaius with his potions as usual and Arthur feels stupid. All of the bloody castle and he hadn't looked for him in his rooms. He gives them some half-assed excuse and flees towards the Physician's chambers, Morgana yelling his name behind him.

“Gaius!” Arthur calls, throwing the door to the physician quarter's open way harder than he needed to, but the blood pumping through his body was too filled with another sort of ice cold fear to have him cower at Gaius' arched brow. “Gaius, where is Merlin?!”

A sad shadow passes through the old man's face, then concern, and his lips finally part in that resigned way to let out a lie.

“You have just missed him sire.” He says, and Arthur all but growls in the back of his throat, sidestepping stools and tables and benches to open the door to Merlin's room — barren of the little belongings he had flung about the cramped space back with the Mortaeus flower. “He left a moment ago to the—”

“He's with the druid girl?!” Arthur lets out, in a high pitched voice that almost had him choke at how desperate he sounded, and if the man was neither so old nor looked so scared he would be holding him by the shoulders and shaking him until he saw sense. “I know he was planning on running away with her but didn't you tell him about the Bastet?! How could you just let him go like this?! No matter he's a sorcerer, no need to worry to death if someone will tell on him and how to avoid my father from burning him to a crisp, we'll just let him serve himself to giant mystical murder panthers, is that right?!”

Gaius might have looked less pale if he had told him Merlin had decided to abandon his studies and join and become a nomad toad-seller. His hand reaches to support himself against his table and Arthur does take half a second to feel bad for not having thought about a better way to break his concern to him, but still.

“He was planning on what?” He asks, and he sounds like he's at the verge of having a heart attacks, not that Arthur can much blame him.

There's no time to answer him before the warning bells sound.

* * *

In the depths of the tunnels, still gripping the dress, the sound of bells ringing descends upon him like a announcement of death; his heartbeat spikes up and a guard outside yells “There she is! Stop!”.

Merlin lets out a breath, horror strangling him, cold hands gripping his heart.

“Freya.”

He runs.

* * *

Above him, Arthur is already running, flanked by knights he wished weren't there, trying to figure out where exactly this is coming from, where she is, how to get rid of them before— and that's how they run into the girl. Father might clap him on his shoulder for this successful chase, but Merlin will hate him forever.

“Please, just let me go.” She asks and he wants to scream.

Behind him, some of the lesser knights and the guards part ways to let _Halig_ past, and his hands twitch near his sword to strike him instead, when his smug face comes in the edges of his vision, smiling and exhilarated, and drawls out “No one escapes from me”.

The clock begins to chime, and he knows this is not the way out he had been wanting, maybe he should just _stop wanting things_ , it would make things easier. He watches in horror as the girl's face flashes with panic and pain, watches her shake and throw her head back and _scream_ and fall to her hands and knees, and his hands grab the hilt of his sword out of reflex, and she keeps screaming until the scream turns into a roar and her skin is covered with black fur, her teeth grow as large and sharp as a knife and the girl transforms into the bastet. He wonders half heartily, as he brings the blade up to defend himself from her attack, if Merlin would hate her if Arthur died trying not to wound her like he will most certainly hate him if he strikes him down.

She attacks first Halig, and the guards flee. He's not much sad about the body on the floor, thinks vindictively about the boy on the floor after he had struck him, and doesn't begrudge any of the men who are still running, didn't expect much from green boys barely drafted. He's much more worried about the fact they are surrounded by knights still, knights that won't let her leave in peace, won't usher her away and beg Merlin is alive to follow her into safety. He moves forward to spook her into flying over the wall, but she flies at him instead, nearly knocks his head clear out of his shoulders.

So much for being a good person.

He rolls back to his feet, follows her to the square where knights are jumping from the passageways, surrounding her and ready to strike. She is in danger, or, rather, she _is_ the danger, any sane person would see that. It's a pity for all of them that the person that fell for her can scarcely see reason with a heart five times the size of his brain; it's a pity he fell for the idiot. Merlin enters the square when the Bastet is ready to attack, eyes cleverly looking for the weaker amidst them, and he's not sure if she retains her human half's memory, but he can't take the chance when her eyes meet Merlin mid growl and don't look away. The idiot takes a step forward, and the Bastet seems to move to approach and he _can't, he can't risk it—_

“Merlin.” He lets out, half a hiss, half a growl, holds onto his sword's hilt as he moves in-between them and swings the blade with the expertise of a man who has been trained to kill from birth.

Arthur slashes across the chest.

She yowls of pain as Merlin screams 'no!' and pulls him back, to the floor.

He would have killed her if Merlin hadn't done that.

She growls once more and takes off flight over their heads before anyone else can hit her, and Merlin scrambles away from him and to his feet, running behind her before he can reach for him to ask if he's okay, to berate him for being here and for making he worry. No, he has no time for that, because Merlin is running towards death again. He takes a page from his manservant's book either way, rolls to his feet too fast for his men to reach to help him up and runs behind the both of them before any of them can process what he is doing.

He doesn't feel glad, but he's still not sure if he's a good person after; Arthur only knows that he didn't have half the moral questions he has now before Merlin.

* * *

Merlin thinks he knew how to breathe, once, before Freya, before this night; right now, his chest rises and falls but he doesn't feel like he's breathing, he feels like he is dying. The torch illuminates the way he knows all too well now, and the sound of her pain guide him further. He hopes she's not dead, he hopes she's not dead, he hopes she's not dead, he hopes she's not dead and he can almost grant hope something when she isn't dead. He reassures her when he finds her, here, in the dark, still in the form of a panther, still wounded and bleeding, and for a moment, she lets him rest his hand on her head and he thinks ‘if she lives, I will take her somewhere safe. I will spend every night with her, and neither of us will have to be afraid’. Then, she shakes her head, pulls from his hand and turns into the tunnels, limps her way past and down them until her soft growls turn into yowls and his eyes are so blurry with tears he can barely see and he thinks he hear steps behind him, but she's crying ahead of him so he doesn't care, can't care, nor right now.

His heart breaks a little more when he turns on the part of the tunnels, near the dress, where she has stayed this long, and finds Freya, human and naked and bleeding and _weeping_. Silently, though his own lips are pressed in a thin line to keep his sobs at bay and his tears are almost running free, he take off his jacket and places it over her, carefully, wraps the fabric around her body and tucks strands of her hair away from her face.

“You must hate me.” She says, crying even more now.

“No.” How can she think that?

“I'm a monster. I tried to tell you.”

“I know.”

“I wasn't always like this.” She says, and shakes her head, but the blood is seeping through Merlin's jacket and the pain through her features. His heart clenches at that with an emotion too agonising too name, and then with something sharp enough that he knows it to be fear when the footsteps sound closer and closer to them.

Someone followed them.

“Shh." He says, pulling her to his chest and backing into the alcove, in such a way Freya's head rests against his chest and her body is draped over his sitting form, an arm wrapped around her for protection and the other holding the torch in case someone does appear and he has to strike them with something less lethal than magic first. His lips brush her forehead, gentle like their first kiss. “You shouldn't try to talk.”

The person trailing behind them knows the way, must have trailed it before, must have followed him before, because he doesn't wander aimlessly through the tunnels, instead going directly towards the safe haven he had tried to make for Freya, and Merlin thrusts out his torch menacingly as the knight turns into the alcove — only to illuminate Arthur's distraught face, as he stumbles back uncertainly and takes in the scene and heaves a breath of relief.

He doesn't know what about this situation could bring anyone relief, but it's _Arthur_. Prince Arthur of Camelot, who knows where he's been hiding Freya and who has looked sadly towards him for the last three days and never questioned when he slipped away to see her.

Arthur who knows.

Arthur who is not trying to strike her down or screaming.

Arthur who didn't tell Uther.

“There was a man. He attacked me. I didn't mean to hurt him, but I thought he was going to kill me.”

“It was an accident.” He tells her, but his eyes are still trailed at Arthur, glaring daggers at him and keeping the torch between them. He keeps watching him as he lays his sword to his side and kneels, hands up in the air in front of him, eyes still flickering over the both of them, assessing her injuries and looking for some at Merlin; if he didn't know him better, he would say he's concerned.

“His mother was a sorceress, and when she find out that I'd killed her son, she cursed me to kill forevermore.” Her laboured breaths give way to a pained groan, and Merlin finally stops looking at Arthur as if he will kill them at any moment to look down at the girl instead, worrying twisting his insides, hand squeezing her shoulder gently.

“I'm going to make you better, Freya.” He promises.

“Merlin.” Arthur cuts in, gentle and slow and too many people are treating him like a cornered animal for him to not glare at him when he does. His hands are still up and he looks sorrowful, apologetic even, and gives him one small shake of his head. “The wound's too deep.”

“You did this to her.” Merlin hisses, pulling his legs closer to his chest, closer to Freya and away from Arthur. “Why would I believe you? Maybe you don't want me to heal her, you just want her to die.”

“I didn't know she wouldn't harm you.” He argues back, _argues_ instead of _screaming_ , but his voice is furious if restrained, and his hands twitch with the urge to become fists a stage wave to aid him proving his point. “If I knew, I would have never done that, but I thought she was going to kill you, and I couldn't—"

“I forgive you.” Freya's weak voice cuts through Arthur words, and both men look down at her, stunned and confused, but she only smiles up at Arthur. “Thank you for looking after him, he doesn't much looks after himself.” Merlin can see Arthur nodding along to the words of his recklessness, but it doesn't seem to be a conscious decision because he still looks as though someone has slapped him across the face. Then her pained face, with her shuddering breaths and her watery eyes looks up at him, and slender fingers hold onto his wrist. “Merlin, I'm dying. There's nothing to be done. Please go.”

“No. I'm not leaving you here.”

“I brought a cart. And two horses. I had set them near here so you could have left when…"

"I'll take you somewhere nice." 

Arthur doesn't look at him, which is good, because Merlin doesn't want to look at him, cradling Freya in his arms gently as he stands, grabs Morgana's dress and gestures for him to lead the way. He does, silently. Freya's laboured breath fill the gap their words and banter left behind, but the rise and fall of her chest is getting shallower and shallower and her blood starts to stain his shirt. Arthur helps them go towards the cart and the horses, helps lift her onto it, even grabs some straw so the wood is not too hard on her back, pretends not to see how he wipes at his eyes and how his hands tremble, but Merlin is not thankful for any of that. If not for him and Gaius, she wouldn't be bleeding into his jacket and stray hay; so when he makes a move to climb on too, Merlin places a hand to his chest and gently guides him a step back — his blue eyes are overtaken by hurt and guilt and Merlin feels cold and cruel and unwilling to let him share their last moment together when he stole the life they were meant to have.

“You can't come with us” Is all he says, even though there are logical explanations such as he disappeared running behind a magical beast and his father will surely be mad with worry and send guards all through the lower town and even into the woods, and he doesn't feel like getting caught. Instead, he choses venom. “Go report to your father. Say you were successful slaying the beast, I'll be back in time to dress you for tomorrow's feast to your honour.”

Arthur flinches.

He enjoys that.

* * *

He opens the physician's chambers for the second time that day, after reporting to his father and being praised for vanquishing the creature, only half a lecture being given to the recklessness with which he chased away the monster, once the tale of brave prince Arthur running behind a magical beast in the name of the kingdom would be spread like wildfire in-between the people and he would grow in fame and appreciation of his citizens for it. He feels gross for being loved in this way, praised for these things; his father perfect, well-behaved war machine.

The door creaks when he opens it, and a sliver of light falls upon Gaius, sat on the same workbench, back to the door, hunched over his table — it's painfully clear that Arthur never 'nearly missed Merlin' as much as Merlin never returned to his rooms after Gaius told Uther about Freya and the Bastet and all but advised him that slaying the creature was the only viable answer — and the sound sends the old man standing up and whirling around to look at the door.

“Merlin, I was so worried—” He begins, but the relieved surprise turns into confusion when he sees who it is at his doorstep. “Arthur?”

“I'm sorry to disappoint, Gaius.” He answers in turn, gently closing the door behind him.

“Where's the girl?”

“She's gone. She's dying.”

Gaius brows furrow even more, but then his lips are a thin line and his face is grim, he nods once and looks down, and Arthur guesses that's all the sorrow one can afford to magical beings if they mean to survive through his father's Purge with their necks intact. His gaze flashes back up, to Arthur, and he knows he will ask now about the one magical person he cares for regardless of his neck or the threat to his life.

“Where's Merlin?” 

“He said he was going to take her somewhere nice.” Arthur replies, but Gaius is already sighing in relief at the small scrap of reassurance that his apprentice is safe that he offered. “Most likely he's going to give her a decent burial.”

“I was so worried he was dead.” He breathes out, sitting back down at his bench and sagging under the knowledge that his grief and fear were proven wrong; that Merlin is somewhere out there, safe and still reckless.

“So was I.” He confesses, seating by the physician, but his sympathy is not as strong as his curiosity. “Did you know?”

“What?”

“Did you know he cared for her when you told my father about her?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“She was a threat to this kingdom." Gaius says, too hard on the words, too firm on his posture, but with eyes downcast and shoulders slightly slumped. Was that what he had told Merlin? Was he trying to convince himself of his words? He couldn't see that going down well with a lovestruck fool, probably his first love too, and certainly.not with a loyal lovestruck fool with no regards to his well-being. He looks at him, inquisitive and tired. “Would you have done any different?”

He thinks of Merlin, eyes gold, of the three days of that knowledge and the dawning realisation that his first shock was just a first shock. That he would never give him to his father to burn. So he feels it's honest enough when one single words slips from his lips:

“Yes.”

* * *

Far away from them, Merlin has dressed Freya on the silk dress he had stolen from Morgana and laid her by the lakeside of Avalon, where's the view of the wake was adorned by the trees and, in the distance, mountains surrounded them. She smiles looking at the lake, whispers ‘you remembered’, he smiles looking at her and replies ‘of course’.

He's sorry for what that sorcerer did to her, for the curse, for the blood she was forced to spill, for Arthur and for the wound that's killing her and for all the hope she poured into her for a life she will never get to live. She shoots down his apology, dismisses his offer to save her, says he already did, but making her feel loved doesn't sound like something so grand as she bleeds out under him.

“I don't want you to go.”

“One day, Merlin, I will repay you. I promise.”

Far away, by the Lake of Avalon, a cursed woman lets out her final breath; her eyes close and she goes lifeless in the arms of a warlock who hugs her and weeps. By the lakeside of Avalon, he's still crying when he brings the boat and makes a bead of the plants he can find around them to lay Freya over. Ankles-deep in the lake of Avalon, he places her in a boat and whispers a spell so it leaves the shore; he follows her a couple of steps, lets the water hits his knees, raises his hands, and falters. In the Lake of Avalon, he gives himself just one more sliver or pointless hope, gives her the time to wake, to breathe in again and open her eyes, and even though he knew she wouldn't, it breaks him a little more when she doesn't.

He raises his hand again, eyes closed.

“ _Wæcce on sæbát bælfýr mæst_.”

The spell ignites the boat. Freya burns, and his heart does too.

* * *

He opens the door to his room to find Merlin sat in the floor, cross-legged and cleaning Arthur's boots as if today was just another day of normal work, and nothing was the matter of the events of yesterday. Sat there, polishing his boots as if he and Gaius had not spent the night wide awake, sat on that god-forsaken bench, waiting for him to come back and worrying more and more as he never did.

Arthur half fears that's if he speaks too loudly, he will shatter the illusion that his manservant is back. That, really, Merlin is already many miles gone and with no intention to turn back. So he closes the door behind him with his elbow, never turning away from him and calls a tentative “Merlin” that draws him to look back at Arthur. He didn't know he was holding his breath, but it gets easier to breathe with blue eyes on him. A soft “I was looking for you” follows, so long after it's almost too awkward to say.

“I know.” He replies, and Arthur just knows he means ‘I was avoiding you’. It hurts, but he doesn't say anything about it. He's quite sure Merlin's hurting much more than him.

He had much less empathy before Merlin. Life was easier without it too. Yet, life would never be easy again if Merlin wasn't there, so he supposes becoming a better person, with morals and questions and empathy, one who could walk towards him and sit down on the floor next to him, was a small prince to pay. His arms hold the legs he brings close to his chest, and he bites down at his lip for a moment, looking at Merlin as Merlin doesn't look at him.

“How are you feeling?” He asks, in the way Morgana asks him how he is feeling when she genuinely cares and not because she placed worms under his bedsheets and now's very well he's simply not well.

“Sad.” Merlin replies, laying one clean boot to his left and reaching for the next and would he please elaborate and s _top_ _cleaning his boots for one second?_ He was never a good servant before, and grief is not the way to get here. “Not that it is surprising. Questioning if I should ready myself for a pyre, but what's new?”

“I would never burn you.” He denies, so quick he has to take a moment to stop and think of it. He means it, he would never allow Merlin to burn. It was a choice between his loyalty to his father and to his manservant, and he picked Merlin without faltering. “I wouldn't have killed her either, I didn't meant to.”

The silence is long, long enough Arthur can be sent spiralling from it in all the ways Merlin hates him now, and he has magic so he's most surely going to kill him, and why did he even come back if he hated him so much, he didn't mean for the stupid druid to die, but maybe calling her stupid isn't the nicest thing he could be doing right now—

“You knew she was there and you didn't tell your father.”

“I didn't.” He agrees, after one stunned moment in which the words didn't register in his mind quite right.

“You prepared horses for us to leave.” Merlin says, and it sounds like an accusation.

“I did.” Arthur answers, and watches him frown down at his shoe, hands slowly halting their work.

“Why would you do that?”

“You said you didn't want to live in fear.” He states the obvious. Fear is all he could offer for a lifetime of loyalty, but Merlin remain quiet, waiting for a better explanation. “You were in love with her. You spoke of where you wanted to live, how you wanted to live, and I could never give you a life like that in here.” He looks down at the floor once, as the words leave him and the sort of vulnerability that his father would berate him for showing unmakes his walls in front of his manservant, but when he looks up at him, Merlin is watching him in this odd way that makes him just this side of exasperated. “Don't tell me you don't know enough of love to know what's like to place their wishes over yours?”

“You love me?” is asked, quiet, in Merlin's voice, breaking at the edges, and he wants to take him in his arms, hug him tight and protect him from the world, but he knows he will fail. He already failed three times, and this time, something in him was broken that he can't fix, he knows that. But, still, he says:

“To the best of my capability, which is not saying much.” like he means it, because he does. He does, with all he can, in the ways he's been taught and that is not enough, he knows, but he can improve if Merlin only asks it of him.

Merlin looks up at him as if he didn't know Arthur was fully human until now; hat he wasn't capable of this brand of love until he was told he was capable of it.

“How long?” He asks, and finally, _finally_ , makes Arthur look away, throat bobbing with the words and insecurity.

“Longer than my dignity can take it if I confess to it right now.”

The silence is long, but he would have rather the silence had stretched for hours between them than the quiet heartache in their voices when they speak: 

“I don't.”

“I know.”

“I can't.”

“It's okay.”

“She...” Merlin tries to say, but he chokes in his words and in his tears, so Arthur's hand gently cups his palm and guides his head to rest on his shoulder. Merlin obliges, shoulders spasming slightly with sobs and fingers gripping at the edges of his tunic. “She died in my arms.”

Arthur thinks he can hear Merlin's heart break through the tone of his voice alone, ring and frail and wavering, and the shards of his own heart tremble at the sound, but don't turn to dust yet. Not yet.

“I'm sorry.”

If he knew that was how he got to keep him, he would have never asked any gods for him to stay. Nevertheless, that's what he did, and as a result Merlin now cries on his shoulder until his clothes dampen with it, and Arthur will hardly spend his whole life repenting for his selfishness by putting him back together again.


End file.
